A Moment Passing By
by Ante Down
Summary: Drabbles set over the course of various episodes. Drabbles for The Sound of Drums now up. Spoilers for every episode aired.
1. Human Nature

**Disclaimer: **Not mine.

**A/N: **I adored Human Nature/Family of Blood. So I put Dancing Round the Issue on hold (though chapter four _is_ on its way) to write this series of proper 100-word drabbles for Human Nature (written before FoB).

---

**Diarist**

It was the picture of the faces that confused John Smith the most.

They were all faces of the Doctor, in his dreams. All of them.

The faces triggered the strangest associations. The curly-haired man in the centre had died in a fire, and Smith knew that as if he had died there too. The short-haired man to his right had been the one who first met Rose. The man in the lower right corner carried celery in his pocket. The man with the hat schemed constantly.

Quirks for interesting characters. He set pen to paper and began to write.

---

**Absent-minded**

It really was as if he'd left the kettle on, Joan mused. He wandered the corridors, carrying far too many books, and tumbled down the stairs because he was too focussed on her to look where he was going. He dreamed and dreamed, and wrote his dreams down.

It was very endearing.

She could understand why his maid hovered around him. Mr. Smith…John…would probably walk off a cliff if it wasn't pointed it out to him. He'd already missed the stairs.

Joan thought she could spend her life pointing out the cliffs to him. She thought she might love him.

---

**All Sorts of Places**

"One more month and I'm free as the wind."

Martha really was an odd one. Head in the clouds as much as her Mr. Smith. They'd arrived two months ago. Smith, it seemed, had plans to stay- oh, Jenny had heard some rumours about him and the matron- but Martha insisted they were both leaving in mid-December. No matter what. It was just for three months.

It was ridiculous, a wild, impossible dream. Martha didn't have money, and Jenny knew she'd never leave Mr. Smith. And besides, where could she go?

"All sorts of places" was all Martha ever said.

---

**Self-Delusion**

"No man should hide himself," Smith had told him.

All the things inside that watch. A wolf howling, a spider-like beast snarling, the metal men marching and the saltshaker machines destroying all in their path. Planets burning, a woman's voice shouting, "Burn with me!"

Things any man would want to hide from. The monsters under the bed come to life, chasing him. Always waiting.

And the man with Smith's face, wielding that blue light, chasing those monsters down. Smith's voice saying, "you are not alone".

Yes, John Smith was a fine one to talk about hiding from oneself, Latimer thought.

---

**A Just and Proper War (One)**

Hutchinson's accusation was perfectly true. He _was_ being deliberately shoddy. He believed in fairness, and machine guns against spears were hardly fair.

Saying so earned him a telling off. "A just and proper war" to fight in…that would be worse. He knew, and he knew he'd fight in it all the same. The enemies would not be armed with spears, and they would not fight on the "Dark Continent".

He would fight in Europe, in the rain and mud. He would fight beside Hutchinson.

And at one minute past the hour, he would die fighting that just and proper war.

---

**A Just and Proper War (Two)**

John had some morbid things written in his diary. This story, for instance, was set in 1914, barely a year from now.

It was a war story. John's messy handwriting told of lines dug into the ground, soldiers fighting in them, of mud and blood and death. She read the words "a shadow across the land" and shivered.

She could remember the Army officers who had come to her door to tell her that Oliver had been killed. A shadow indeed.

But when she talked to John, he smiled and said it was just a dream, and she believed him.

---

**Artist**

"Where did you learn to draw?"

"Gallifrey," Smith said, without any hesitation.

_The chill of the night air on his skin, a pencil pressing against his fingers, a paper in front of him,_

_He drew of places he hadn't seen, different buildings, strange people, unfamiliar constellations. Young voices laughed as he said that he'd go there one day._

_More voices, older voices that laughed in wonder as he showed them the buildings, the people, the constellations, and he didn't need to draw._

Then there was just a lopsided scarecrow and Joan, who laughed without needing to see those strange skies.

---

**Lasting**

It was never going to last, Smith and Joan. It couldn't last. Because Smith couldn't last.

Not just for the world's sake, but for hers. Damned if she'd be stuck in 1913 for the rest of her life, scrubbing floors, serving Smith tea and putting up with the students making fun of her skin.

She was a bit sorry that she'd have to take Smith from Joan. But this was so much bigger than just Joan.

An alien in hiding and a matron from 1913? It couldn't last. Shouldn't.

Because ultimately, it wasn't just her who needed the Doctor back.

---

**Fantasist**

He'd never thought Martha was that inclined to fantasy. His sensible if overprotective and definitely improper maid, believing the stories he'd written in his journal.

He'd only told her the one dream. Just the one, where she was his companion. It seemed she'd taken it to heart, because she had been rather too familiar since then. Familiar enough to slap him.

Any why would she be so desperate to find that watch? It obviously hadn't been important enough for him to keep track of.

Never mind all that. There were more important things in his life than a delusional maid.

---

**Different**

Martha had to be crazy. Joan clung to that thought. John couldn't be the Doctor of his journal, the man who had been to so many places, seen so many terrible things. She didn't want to think about the possibility that he'd been separated from this (real?) Rose woman like she'd been separated from Oliver.

Her John couldn't be an alien only pretending to be human. John seemed incapable of deception.

John was not the Doctor. She had to believe that.

But as the gun was held to her head, she began to think that Martha might have been right.


	2. Family of Blood

**Disclaimer: **Not mine.

**Guardian Angel**

Martha knew she'd do anything for the Doctor. She would have shot, if she had to, no matter how scared she was. To save him.

She had to protect the Doctor, and that meant protecting Smith, who seemed woefully incapable of it. Useless, he was. He wasn't even leaving, just standing around stupidly.

Okay, he was showing her some concern. But he certainly wasn't trying to save her. No, he was standing outside waiting for her, as if it was actually a dance.

She yelled at him to run. She had to protect Smith. She had to protect the Doctor.

---

**Curiosity**

"We want John Smith and whatever he's done with his Time Lord consciousness."

His? His? It was a dream, only a dream. He had no other consciousness. Oh god oh god, what did they think he had done with it, left it in his other jacket? A consciousness- a _whole other person_- was hardly something one left lying around on the mantelpiece.

Except according to Martha, he had.

Baines was speaking again. "War is coming," he heard from his place at the window.

God help them all, if that was true. He hurried back to the boys.

God help them.

---

**Doctors**

Despite Martha's denials, Joan knew that Martha was hopelessly in love with "the Doctor". Not John Smith. The Doctor. An alien.

She took refuge in her superior knowledge. No matter where the Doctor was from, no matter where _Martha_ was from, there were some things Joan knew.

Then Martha gave her a frosty look and listed all the bones in the hand, without hesitation or a mistake.

And for the first time, Joan felt threatened. The maid was a doctor, a proper doctor, in love with the Doctor, so much bigger and grander than Joan and John could ever be.

---

**The Better Part of Valour**

"What should I do?" Latimer asked the consciousness trapped inside the watch.

"Beware," Smith's- _the Doctor's_- voice echoed in his mind.

"Of what?"

"Of her."

_What should I do?_ he thought.

_Show them this_, an answer came. _And then run._

Run?

_Run._

What am I showing them?

_Me. Angry. It should buy you enough time._

And then what?

_Wait. It's not the right time. But soon._

Latimer had faith enough. So he opened the watch, and saw the Doctor, standing in fire and flood. It scared him just as much as the girl.

_Now run! Run! Find me, wake me!_

---

**Come Home**

The Family had the TARDIS. Things were getting progressively worse.

And Smith was getting progressively more agitated.

"Who am I, then? Nothing? I'm just a story." He looked broken as he said it; Martha could barely believe that Smith could possibly be her Doctor. She didn't look at him, and he left her side, obviously hurting.

Things were bad. People were in danger. And the Doctor was not there to save them.

Come back, Doctor, she thought. We need you. I need you. Doctor…

But there was nothing she could do.

Martha got up and followed John Smith and Joan.

---

**Fear**

Latimer spoke of the Doctor and his strange, mad world. It was inconceivable to John that he could ever be, ever have been, this…this alien being, the wild man of his wildest dreams. The man who even his companion said was terribly lonely.

Stories. Stories.

Then he grabbed the watch, and it was calling to him.

_Closer, closer, a little bit closer…_

And then words were pouring out of his mouth, words that weren't his and were, in a voice that was his and wasn't.

He choked the words back. They weren't his. He didn't want to become that. Ever.

---

**Journal's End**

Joan looked through the pages as John and Martha spoke, desperate to find some of the Doctor's knowledge of the Family. Something that would let them fight, without destroying John Smith.

She didn't find it.

She found what the Family would do if they got their hands on that watch. It couldn't be allowed to happen. And it meant losing John.

She'd said to Martha that it was like he had something important to get back to, something that he couldn't remember. All that time, it had been the Doctor showing through.

She should have known some things were impossible.

---

**Outsider**

She had no words. Smith was making his choice. Without her. She wasn't a part of John Smith's life, not in any meaningful way.

Staff. Part of the furniture, almost.

It wasn't fair. She was part of the Doctor's life, more than Joan. But that was jealousy. Smith was, after all, trying to decide whether he should in effect commit suicide.

She wanted the Doctor back so badly. But Smith…was in love.

She could do nothing more to influence Smith. She hoped he took what she had said into account, because she had told Smith the truth she never told _him_.

---

**Can, and Cannot**

The life she'd seen…she wanted it. And from the look on John's face he did too.

But he, as a Time Lord, could not have a life with her. Not the life they wanted, with children and a home. Worse, John was probably right. How could the Time Lord love her?

But John…John could live that life, with her. He wasn't a grand adventurer, he hadn't seen the universe, he hadn't lived enough lifetimes to make her look a child. He was her equal.

Only he couldn't, because he had to save everyone. John couldn't do that. The Doctor could.

---

**Agony**

"What are you going to do?"

It all came down to the simple fact that the village was worth more than him. The watch was lying in his palm, under Joan's hand.

He didn't say, "What choice do I have?"

He did kiss Joan goodbye.

Then he closed his eyes and opened the watch. It was pain beyond John's imagination, but he could feel the Doctor's consciousness taking over his own. The pain was not beyond _his_ comprehension.

The Doctor opened his eyes. He looked at Joan for a long moment, but left without a word, not even to Martha.

---

**Heart's Desire and Despair**

When he chained the Father, he thought of John Smith and his sacrifices, life, job, love, for the Doctor's cause.

When he tricked the Mother into the event horizon, he thought of Joan, who had only ever loved two men and had lost them both.

When he bound the Daughter into every mirror, he thought of his children that could have been. And Martha, Rose, Susan, and everyone he had cared for in his long life.

And when he suspended the Son in time, dressed him as a scarecrow and appointed him protector of England's fields, he thought of himself.

---

**Ghost**

John Smith was gone. Burnt by fire, frozen by ice, washed away by the storm, lost in the night, thrown into the heart of the sun and replaced by the Doctor.

She looked in his eyes and saw not John, but the turn of the universe. How could the Doctor see only her amongst all those stars?

She looked in his eyes and saw not John, but an alien who thought nothing of the danger he brought and the lives he inadvertently destroyed.

He told her to join him, request filled with all the confidence John never had.

She declined.

---

**Repaired**

The Doctor was back from dealing with the Family. He'd gone by himself, and then gone to see Joan. Martha couldn't blame him for wanting to keep that conversation private.

While he was talking, she put on her 2007 clothes with relief. Her days of being a maid were over.

The Doctor hugged her, and everything was all right again. It was as if she had never told him she loved him, as if he'd never fallen in love with someone else. It was just like ever other time they had reunited after a dangerous situation.

As if nothing happened.

---

**One Minute Past The Hour**

Latimer knew it was coming. One minute past the hour, in that just and proper war he saw himself fight years ago.

One minute past the hour, and they would both die unless he did something.

It was five to the hour now. Hutchinson had been shot in the leg.

Four to the hour, and they had passed the row of barbed wire.

Three to, and they were struggling through mud.

Two to, and the real bombardment was starting.

One to…

…the hour.

One minute past the hour. The time had come.

Two minutes past the hour, they were alive.


	3. Utopia

**Disclaimer: **Not mine.

**A/N: **I really hate taking down 'completed' signs. But I adored Utopia too, and thought I'd write drabbles for it as well. Chances are there'll be more for the remaining two episodes…and good lord, it's hard to do this when you don't know where the story is going.

**Nostalgia (One)**

It's strange, being back in Cardiff, even if he doesn't plan to leave the TARDIS. Martha's questions about the 'earthquake' only accentuate the feeling. He thinks about those events, for the first time in a long time. It's not often he lets himself think about those last days in his old body.

But he's back in Cardiff, and there's something there that shouldn't be. It's oil in water. A ball bearing in marbles. He knows this feeling too. A fact, impossibly heavy to his sense of time.

He knows that feeling. It's part of why he ran from Platform Five.

---

**The Drums Beat Louder**

The time was coming. The rocket was near completion. Yana had lived for this- to help the remnants of humanity find their way to Utopia.

He'd die for it. He'd see the end of the universe. He'd see humanity safe. It was such a shame that he couldn't see Chantho safe too.

All of a sudden, the drums sounded louder. Rat-tat-tat, rat-tat-tat, almost martial in their beat.

He dismissed it. He'd heard the drums every minute of his life. But he couldn't shake the feeling that something else, something more than the rocket's departure, was drawing near.

---

**Nostalgia (Two)**

The first thing he noticed was that the Doctor didn't look at all surprised to see him wake up from the dead. He just looked vaguely exasperated.

The second thing he noticed was the pretty young woman leaning over him. His attention was diverted by the Doctor's command to stop. He stood up.

"Doctor," he said. It's all the greeting he needs.

"Captain," was the chilly reply.

"You abandoned me." He levelled the accusation, aching to see how the Doctor would respond.

He just blew it off. And all of a sudden Jack wanted his Doctor back, the proper Doctor.

---

**The End of Knowledge**

"What killed it?" Martha asked him.

"Time. Just time," he replied.

And nobody could know how lethal time could be better than he did. He had seen many things, people and planets and stars and galaxies die through age. The passage of time.

It really hit him then that the universe was dying. This was the end. He couldn't go much further. There were limits. This was the edge, the fence at the end of his property.

He shouldn't have been so bothered as he was. Everything had its time, and everything died.

But in this case, it scared him.

---

**Newt**

Martha couldn't believe it. The Doctor had grown another hand. And he didn't seem to think it was an issue. Indomitable, he had called humans. He'd know about indomitable. She'd never met anyone so resilient in her life.

His hand. He'd regrown his _hand_. Like…like a newt. She could barely believe it. He looked so _human_. And humans definitely couldn't regrow limbs. How could he do that, she wondered. Just how different was his biology?

"All this time, and you're still full of surprises," she said, still a bit shaky from her shock. She really was travelling with an alien.

---

**The Tempo Speeds Up**

New humans. Well-dressed, well-fed, clean, without a trace of the fear most of the humans had. And they hadn't asked Yana if they could be taken to Utopia. Who didn't know about Utopia? Who didn't harbour the belief that they could be saved from the collapse of reality itself?

Even though the Doctor (Time Lord, last of) claimed that he was clueless about the technology, he still thought that perhaps, just perhaps, he could help.

He was proved spectacularly right as the Doctor fixed the boost reversal circuit. Work was under way again. Hope was restored. The drums sped up.

---

**Hope**

The system was brilliant. The Doctor wasn't sure he could do better under the circumstances.

Food and string and staples could save humanity. And it _would_ be humanity who saved themselves with odds and ends, desperation and determination.

He almost wanted to go with them. It was in his nature. He'd seen so much of the universe, he almost wanted to see if there could be anything beyond.

But then the call came in- they'd found his TARDIS. The mad desire vanished. The TARDIS was his way to the (burning) stars, his way back to the universe proper. His utopia.

---

**Salamander**

That was possibly one of the strangest things she'd seen on her travels with the Doctor, Martha thought.

Jack had been dead. Definitely. Life extinct. Dead as a dodo. Except he'd lurched back into life and made a joke about kissing as if he died every day.

Oh, who knew, maybe he did. Maybe he did 'die' quite frequently.

What would it be like, she wondered. How would it feel to die and to come back to life? Electrocution must be painful. What would it feel like to know you couldn't die? Martha shivered. She wouldn't wish that on anyone.

---

**Hurt **

"In the end, I got the message."

It hadn't been a message he welcomed. Though it was only vaguely covered in his Time Agent training, he was pretty sure that nobody was supposed to be unkillable.

He'd recovered from his bout of existential angst. But the pain was brought back as he heard the Doctor calmly tell him that his existence was _wrong_. Jack thought the Doctor might be regarding him not so much as a person, but as a problem to be solved.

And perversely, that made him realise he didn't want to die. He _wasn't_ just a problem.

---

**The Stuff Of Legends**

Jack asked him how. He had to. The Doctor couldn't fault him for that.

But…he didn't want to tell.

It would be the most he'd talked about Rose since she'd been trapped in the parallel world. It would be the first time he'd really talked about the events that ended his ninth life.

He could remember how he'd felt when he'd absorbed the Time Vortex. He didn't want to relive that. Instead, he told Jack about Rose, about the Time Goddess who could not control the power she gained. The Time War ending in life.

He told Jack a legend.

---

**Chameleon**

It was a watch like the Doctor's. Identical. Could it be? Could the Professor be a Time Lord in hiding? She felt a rush of nervous happiness for the Doctor, coupled with complete amazement.

But this is what could have happened to the Doctor, had he not opened the watch. He could have lived and died a human, never knowing anything of Time Lords or TARDISes or fighting in terrible wars. He could have blended in, lived a normal life.

The Doctor might not be the last Time Lord.

This day was turning out more impossible revelations by the minute.

---

**A Beat Like The Tick Of A Clock**

The drums sounded loud as the watch spoke in his mind. Speaking with the Doctor's voice, and then another. The phrases echoed in his mind. He could barely hear Martha telling him to leave it alone.

The drums beat loudly, louder than his heart, louder than his thoughts. All he could hear were the echoes of voices, talking of the Time War, regeneration, TARDISes and time travel.

The beats were regular now, pounding loudly and viciously in his skull. Like there was a clock crammed into his head. A waiting beat. He wished it would stop.

He opened the watch.

---

**You Are Not Alone (But You Are)**

He knew Yana had opened the watch. He could feel the presence of another Time Lord in the back of his mind. Just one other, where there had been so many. Where there had been none, until just now.

But it wasn't another he wanted to feel. He would know that mind anywhere.

You.

Are.

Not.

Alone.

He could see it now. A message for him, a message for the Master. And it hurt, knowing that the only other Time Lord in the universe was the only one who would never talk to him.

He was not alone? He was.

---

**The Drums Beat For War**

He was free of that watch, with a young, strong body. Free to do what he pleased, save for the interference of the Doctor.

And they certainly had some catching up to do. He didn't think the Doctor would be trapped on Malcassairo. The Doctor had not survived the Time War to be killed by the Futurekind.

No, he would escape and hunt him down. So the Master would retreat and lay a trap. He would go to the home time of the Doctor's female companion and base himself there. Start his empire from there.

The Master felt young again.

---

**His Master's Voice**

The Master's new voice was young, the Doctor realised. Energetic. Manic.

The Master sounded like him now, and the thought chilled his soul. Had he become that, laughing at death and destruction? Laughing at the helplessness of others?

Even the Master's comment on his new voice recalled his own comments about teeth after he regenerated.

No. He wasn't like that. Surface resemblance. Nothing more.

Think. Futurekind at the door. TARDIS leaving. One friend in mortal danger, one friend unable to die. Think, Doctor, think.

His thoughts were drowned out by the Futurekind's shouts, the TARDIS' rotors, and the Master's voice.


	4. The Sound of Drums

**Disclaimer: **Not mine.

**A/N: **Well, here's the next lot of drabbles. Can't wait for Saturday and the finale!

---

**Vote Saxon**

She knew that voice, she'd said she did. It was a nice voice, a voice you could trust. It was a strong voice, a leader's voice. It spoke of healing, of a golden age for Britain. She'd vote for that voice.

She'd last heard that voice taunting the Doctor from inside the TARDIS as it was piloted away from them, leaving them stranded in a room with those Futurekind trying to get in, pushing at the door.

When she'd last heard that voice, it had left her to die, along with the Doctor.

Martha Jones would not be voting Saxon.

---

**God Has a Sense of Humour**

Throwing papers around the room, that was funny. Manic smiles were funny. Winding the Cabinet up was _definitely_ funny. Albert and his harping about policy was not funny.

Good lord, could these people not distinguish between what was serious and what was not? It was _obvious_ that these people were fat traitors. Why could they not accept it? Why must they treat a serious failure of character as a joke?

Disposing of Cabinet was both funny and serious. And when they were dead, he leaned forward to tap the sound of the drums on the table. That was not funny.

---

**The Choices We Make**

Lucy was no fool. Flattery was lovely, but someone so eager to talk to her, someone so eager to have Miss Jones out of the room, that was rather more worrisome.

She knew that there was no Harold Saxon. It was not Harold Saxon she loved, but the Master. Not _her_ Master; claiming him would be the height of arrogance.

He wasn't perfect, she knew. But she loved him. She was his "faithful companion" as he called her. She'd made her choice. It required sacrifices- Vivian Rook.

When he hugged her, she had no doubts she'd made the right choice.

---

**Bogeymen and Monsters**

Toclafane. Humanity would be so embarrassed if they knew they'd been introduced to something that was, essentially, the monster under the bed. But what were they? He'd never seen a species like them.

About the only thing he could say they were with any sort of certainty is that they were allies of the Master, who was definitely a threat. A monster far more dangerous than most. Mad now, too. More so than ever.

But for all the Master's dangerous insanity, the Doctor knew that he could not destroy this monster. He could not destroy the last of his race.

---

**Loyalty (One)**

Francine Jones thought she had done the right thing by Martha, until Saxon's people turned on her and dragged her to the van along with her ex. She'd been helping them!

Just as she was being shoved into the van, her daughter pulled up, that Doctor in the seat next to her. The Doctor was speaking to Martha; telling her to leave, she hoped. To run and hide.

She only wanted what was best for her daughter. Right now it was for Martha not to be shot by Saxon's people. Francine called to her daughter, "Martha! Get out of here!"

---

**Recount**

"Where is it, Doctor?"

"Gone."

"How can Gallifrey be gone?" The Master had nearly spit those words out, disbelief and anger in his voice.

The Doctor had dreaded having to give this explanation. Sure enough, the Master demanded one. It was strange to speak of Gallifrey to someone who appreciated what its loss meant. Stranger still to have a conversation with a veteran of the Time War that went beyond "Ex-ter-min-ate".

He was grateful that Martha had made him speak of Gallifrey- it was easier to speak of it now.

It was almost as if the wound was healing.

---

**To Feel Like God**

The Master was perfectly capable of putting two and two together. Gallifrey was gone, but the Doctor was not. Therefore…

The Master thought of having the lives and deaths of two civilisations that had been thought untouchable in his control. His to end. Ultimate power. What did it feel like, he asked the only one to have possessed that power.

The Doctor's desperate order of "Stop it!" provided him all the answer he needed. He pressed his advantage, toying with a model of the world he would soon have the same power over, tapping the rhythm that drove him mad.

---

**Legends of Gallifrey**

When the Doctor had told her about his home planet, he had told her about a beautiful world, with orange skies and silver trees. He told stories well; she could almost see it in her mind.

The psychopathic "Master" didn't fit with the image of peace and wisdom at all. She could barely fit the Doctor into her conception of such a society, but the Master…no way.

Now the Doctor told of a civilisation that took children from their families at eight years old to stare into the Time Vortex. Martha shivered. There was a dark side to the stories.

---

**Look Into The Abyss**

He'd run away when he'd looked into the Vortex. Run away like the Master had from the Time War. He'd only been eight, and he had been confronted with infinity. It had been overwhelming, and he'd ran away.

He never did stop running. He'd run to the stars. Later, he realised he had run into infinity to escape the sight of it. That realisation was not enough to stop him travelling. Infinity as seen in fragments was easier to bear than its raw form.

He kept running because if he saw infinity again, he would stand firm and go mad.

---

**Homage**

Jack hadn't really expected the Doctor to understand, really. Nor had he expected him to accept, not after he found out that Canary Wharf had led to Rose's death. No, not death- her separation from the Doctor.

Still. His work after Canary Wharf, his efforts to prevent the reconstruction of Torchwood One, that kinder, gentler approach…the Doctor had dismissed it.

He had done it for the Doctor. Torchwood was becoming something that the Doctor could approve of. Could even work with. He had done it _for him_.

"It's like when you fancy someone, and they don't even know you exist."

---

**One Lion, A Hundred Rats**

What sort of fool was Saxon? He flouted UN conventions and talked of what was behind his sofa. He made first contact with an alien race and tried to introduce him, the President (-Elect) of the United States, to his wife instead. He was told me might be removed from office, and all he could do was make silly faces!

How did he get elected?

It hardly mattered. He would be running this show now. Saxon was a clown, only concerned about the publicity and making silly jokes.

And he had to have imagined the predatory glint in Saxon's eyes.

_(I would rather be ruled by one lion than a hundred rats. –Voltaire on democracy)_

---

**This Is The Way The World Ends**

Memory lane. Lazarus. The Doctor worked out what was coming before the Master got round to finishing his gloating. This wouldn't be good.

He was absolutely right. Now he was old and sprawled on the floor, uncomfortably aware that he could probably not stand unaided. He was useless now, except for his mind.

He had lost. The Master was in control. The Toclafane would descend on Earth. He still didn't know what they were. He didn't have much hope.

The Master said his hearts would break. They were already broken. All he had left was Martha, Jack and a whimper.

---

**Loyalty (Two)**

The Doctor was helpless. Her family were Saxon's prisoners. Martha wanted to stay, despite the presence of the Master, who was obviously insane and more dangerous than anything she'd come across in her travels with the Doctor.

But other things were more important. She was the only one who could help him. she was the only one who could help save the world. She couldn't do it from the Valiant.

So she stood apart from her friends and family and teleported back. The Doctor would want her to do the best thing for everyone.

But she was _definitely_ coming back.

---

**Genesis and Revelations**

The drums beat loudly inside his head as he took the Doctor by one arm, and Lucy took the other. Between them they helped the Doctor to the window, to show him the beginning of the Master's rule.

He knew now what it was like to have that absolute power, and he had the exact Biblical words for the occasion.

"And so it came to pass that the human race fell and the Earth was no more. And I looked down upon my new dominion as Master of all. And I thought it…good."

Ta-ta-ta-tum. The sound of drums beating on.


End file.
